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CHARITIES giving swags to homeless people with nowhere but the streets to sleep have 300 people on the Sunshine Coast waiting list - and that's only scratching the surface of the problem.

Street Swags founder Jean Madden said on average 82% of homeless families were turned away from emergency shelters across the country, and she knew of one organisation on the Coast that turned away 94% of the desperate people knocking on their door.

"The Sunshine Coast has had, for a long time, a very significant problem with homelessness," she said.

"The need for Street Swags is extreme. It's a lot higher on the Sunshine Coast because there's not enough emergency accommodations for the number of homeless."

The swags are waterproof canvas with a high-density foam mattress that rolls into a lightweight carry bag with room for extra belongings.

Ms Madden said the face of homelessness had changed with the global financial crisis.

"Before, it was the old-fashioned trifecta of drugs and alcohol, coupled with domestic abuse and mental illness," she said.

"Families started becoming the fastest growing demographic and now they're the largest number.

"They can't get Centrelink because they don't have an address."

Ms Madden said the Queensland Council of Social Services counted 71,000 dwellings needed across Queensland, with the area of greatest need being south-east Queensland.

The Shack in Nambour has been supplying Street Swags since 2005, but Pastor Dale Dowler said they were only for the most needy.

"You have to really rough it to get a swag from us - most will grab them if they're couch surfing, so we have a strict criteria with our Street Swags," he said.

"We don't charge for them, so there is a chance of that being abused."

In the past three weeks The Shack had given out 10 swags, which Mr Dowler said was a "steady flow".

"We could give out more if we had more," he said.

Mr Dowler said the homeless population on the Coast was high because a lot of people were passing through while heading north, or visiting mental health facilities.

He said there were also varying levels of homelessness and people seeking help.

The pastor said he had "three or four" families who sought help from The Shack yesterday alone, which was not unusual.

"These aren't homeless - they've got a home, but once they've paid out their rents there's not a lot left," he said.

"There's an increase in that situation, but it's probably the fact people are moving from the cities thinking it's cheaper here on the Coast. It's not."